Day 52

The kids finished their book reports today. Sarah felt like Rachel and Sam both chose easy options for theirs and she chose the long way. I don't think I agree, but that's ok. Sarah wrote a significant amount more than the others, but I don't think she would have had to. Rachel said hers was very easy; she changed the point of view for a scene. I haven't read it yet. Sam finished his pictures and wrote a sentence about each one.

He likes to put his pen to the paper as long as it's drawing; but if it's writing, it feels like torture to him. I don't mind his not writing much, because I know he has plenty in his head. We talk constantly, and he composes plenty of things. It just kills him to write the words. I think his brain clenches up when he thinks about committing it to paper. I do know that eventually he'll have to do it more, so I think I'll have to take this year to slowly have him do more and more.

We had some great dinner conversation tonight thanks to Julie Bogart's Writer's Jungle webinar. She talked about revision, and I mentioned to Sarah that it would probably help her to listen to it. It was about revision being a re-visioning of your writing. It's so much more than editing or proofreading. You can't expect to have your writing come out of you just the way it ought to stay--at least not most of the time. We decided that Jeff should write something for her to revise. I'm so excited for her to try that. She edited Rachel's book with her, but that's not creating a new vision for the piece. I think it could be liberating for her to just rip something apart. I hope that gives her the freedom to do that to her own writing.

I decided that Sam probably needs to slow down on the Pre-Algebra. The procedures, of course. I'm planning on seeing if he can figure out for himself how to do the problems before telling him how. Hopefully that way he'll be able to do something in his brain with the procedures, and they'll stick. We'll see.

See you next week!

Day 51

I was giggling with the kids today about making the noun form of the word spontaneous. They just could not come up with the word. Here are some of their guesses: spontanium, spontasium, spontanianism, spontanuity. Then Sam said, "Hey, the noun form of notorious is notoriety."The next guess was spontanery. We laughed ourselves silly. They knew none of those were actual words, but they couldn't get at spontaneity. So I asked them if they really hadn't heard it before. They thought they might have, but they weren't sure. I'm sure they've heard it plenty of times and known what it was at the time. This evening, the girls were watching one of The Great Courses, and the word was used in the lesson. It seems to always happen that when we've been paying attention to a word, we'll notice it used soon after.

They all worked on their book reports today. Sam's drawing some great pictures; I'll have to put some on here when he's done. Rachel seems to be having fun with rewriting her scene, but Sarah was having trouble feeling satisfied with her writing. She had wanted to write a letter from one character to another, but it didn't sound good to her after she got started. Then she thought she'd just do a regular summary type report, but that seemed wrong too. She decided on journal entries in the end. I think it's going to be great. She's a very good writer, but I wonder if that label has made her hesitant to write. Like maybe she thinks she has something to live up to. I think she thinks it all has to sound perfect when it comes out of her. I have talked to her numerous times about just writing any old junk and revising after, but she feels like she can't revise either. She was sad about it not being good enough and I got upset about her giving up. I'm sure I handled it totally wrong, but I think tomorrow will be better.

We started reading Black Horses for the King today. It seemed like it wasn't that easy to read aloud. I don't know if it was the size of the type or just the words. Have you ever noticed some books have words that just don't flow out loud? Maybe it's just me; I don't know. I do need to get some different glasses, though. That might be it. The book seems like it might be good.

We couldn't get to the grocery yesterday because of being locked out, so we had to go today. I had an appointment this afternoon that I completely forgot about because I was at the store. By the time I remembered, I couldn't get ahold of the lady I was supposed to meet. I guess she'll just think I'm brainless. She might already think that anyway--what's new? My memory is full of holes!

See you tomorrow!

Day 50--Locked out of the house

Today is my birthday. When I woke up, I could hear the girls downstairs making me a cake. Yay for teenagers! It had carmel on it, and it was so yummy. I also had an email from Jeff first thing. Nothing like a birthday love note. It was a nice relaxed morning, and I finally took a shower right before lunch. I can't remember what we did for school before that; because a little while after lunch, we locked ourselves out of the house!

My parents came by to bring me a birthday card (they were on their way out to eat for their anniversary--yes, I was an anniversary present), and they weren't getting out of the car because it was raining. So we went out to see them at the car, and one of the kids pulled the door shut. It has a very stupid lock arrangement. It doesn't unlock when you turn it, so if you don't do it on purpose you get locked out. It happens all the time, but there has always been someone left in the house to open the door.

I thought of having the fire department get us in, but I didn't really want to do that. The neighbor used to have a key, but they gave it to us when we moved in. I called the landlord several states away and he asked his brother-in-law (who lives around here) if he still had a key, but no. Finally, we called a locksmith. I think I'll have an extra key made and give it to my parents. Locksmiths are expensive.

We read some more of The Making of America today. I found this amazing quote that perfectly describes what is going on with the government. It's on page 10. Someone named Samuel Langdon said it. ". . .be careful in your choice of your representatives and the higher powers of government. Fix your eyes upon men of good understanding and known honesty; men of knowledge, improved by experience; men who fear God and hate covetousness; who love truth and righteousness, and sincerely wish for the public welfare. . . Let not men openly irreligious and immoral become your legislators. . . If the legislative body are corrupt, you will soon have bad men for counselors, corrupt judges, unqualified justices, and officers in every department who will dishonor their stations. . . Never give countenance to turbulent men, who wish to distinguish themselves and rise to power by forming combinations and exciting insurrections against government. . ."

Amazing isn't it? People have not put men of good understanding, honesty, etc into power and now look at the mess. All those things he warned against have happened! Incredible.

We didn't get to start a new book today since we were locked out for 4 hours, but I did have the kids work on their book reports for a while. Sam's doing a story board of The Sherwood Ring. He's drawing at least 4 scenes with a label or caption under each. I wanted him to do some dialog, but he didn't put people in the first picture. I really don't think he heard me tell him what all I expected. I'll have to write it down for him so he can keep it in mind.

Rachel is writing a scene from her book from the perspective of a different character than how the original was written. She's doing Shakespeare Stealer. I don't know what scene she chose, but she's having fun with it.

Sarah is doing Understood Betsy. She did a freewrite to get herself started. She's writing a letter from Betsy to her aunt back home about what it's like staying with her other relatives. I can't remember their names right now. I suggested to her that she might write one letter with the perspective of just having left and one from the perspective Besty has after she's been gone a while and has learned to take care of herself. I can't wait til they get them done; I'm excited to read them!

See you tomorrow!

Day 49

First thing this morning, Jeff and I had to go to get our car registrations renewed. As soon as I walked into the Bureau of Motor Vehicles, I could smell an unreasonably strong perfume smell, so I told Jeff I'd get a headache and I'd have to wait out on the sidewalk. I watched him through the window until his number was called, and then I ran in. He was explaining to the worker that I needed to wait outside until my registration was ready to sign, but she got it ready in about 20 seconds! I couldn't believe it. I've never seen anything go so fast at the BMV! I signed it and ran back outside, and she told Jeff that it was some kind of room freshener that was automatic or something and the workers had no control over it. It was absurd. It smelled like someone had spilled a bottle of perfume in there. Thankfully I didn't get a headache.

While we were gone, Sarah helped Rachel rehearse for the video audition for that church video I mentioned Friday. She needed to submit it today, so they did a few recordings and we watched them all and helped her choose which to send. She did a good job. She loves that kind of thing. I wish I could get her into a play or something. My moms' group told me about a group that does a play every year, but they practice every Friday for 4 hours! Every Friday. All school year. They don't do the play until June, and you can only miss 2 rehearsals! I can't commit to that with my health. Frankly, even if my health were perfect, I'm not sure I could commit to that. I think it's way too much.

We watched a question and answer session with the independent presidential candidate, Evan McMullin, during lunch. I think it's been sad that within the memory of my children, I haven't been able to teach them to respect the office of president in the way that I learned to. And this year, the presidential election stuff has just been ridiculous. But Evan McMullin actually answers questions. Every one of them. He has a brain, morals and worthwhile experience.

My kids hear everyone talking about how they have to pick one of the big candidates even though they don't want either one of them. But we teach them to vote for someone that they can feel good about. Someone who manifests ideals that we agree with. To actually vote "for" someone and not just against someone worse. I'm so relieved that I can vote "for" someone. I want to be able to look in the mirror after voting.

The other day, I heard Rachel tell her cousin it made her wish she wasn't turning 18 until after the election. That's pretty sad. It should be so exciting getting to vote for the first time--not nauseating. We also watched some of the presidential debate tonight. Now that was nauseating. And boring.

We finished The Sherwood Ring today. We really liked it. Maybe we're out of our boring book slump. I'm going to have to think of some little thing they can write about it tomorrow. Maybe I should have them do a short summary since I'm not having them do any summarizing for their book reports. Maybe I'll have them write on note cards to make it a bit more interesting--and short.

See you tomorrow!

Day 48--Decisions, decisions

When I woke up this morning, I wasn't sure we should sell the house! I couldn't believe it. We had this whole big family discussion about it. It was not happy. In the end, we decided to go ahead. Nobody wants to move back to that very tiny house. It was a relief to accept the offer. I just don't know if it will go through. Cross your fingers.

We went over there today to meet the carpet guy in case we end up having to fix the floor. We were also going to clean off the paint so it would look better, but the cleaner stuff was a pain. I'm sure the guy saw it with the floor splotched up. I don't know exactly when he looked at it, but it must have been in the last 2 or 3 weeks since we've been painting and making a mess on the floor. He didn't ask for a floor allowance or anything. But we still picked a carpet and got a quote that's good for 30 days in case we need to use it. It was hard to pick a color; we never have much luck with picking colors.

Jeff and I went out with some other couples tonight, and the kids stayed home and practiced for a video audition Rachel's going to do. Our church does videos about different things, and they have people send in audition videos so they can have actors from all over. It's all the way across the country and I don't think she could go do it if she got the part, but it's a good experience for her to do the audition. She's done a few before and it's fun.

That's seriously all we did today (besides a short stop at the grocery), so why did it take all day? Well, I guess we cut the grass at the old house too. It seemed like we were rushing around all day. Maybe that's also because we had trouble emailing the forms to the realtor. She kept not getting them all even though they were all right there. That was a little annoying. I never can figure out how other people get so much done. Maybe they don't do as much as I think they do. And maybe other people think I do way more than I actually do. But my list is always longer than my day!

See you next week!

Day 47

Last night at the moms meeting, we talked about how long we've been homeschooling and how we started. There were 4 ladies besides me last night. We have about 4 more that couldn't make it. So we have a variety of methods, curricula, and "years of service" in our group. One lady was even homeschooled herself. I think we'll add her mom to the group.

We also talked about getting into college and high school transcripts and diplomas. We talked about staying in our pajamas all day and how our kids can tell we're going out or someone is coming to dinner because of the level of clean in the house and the amount of food we're cooking. It was just so nice. I've never felt like anyone was against what I do, but I've never felt like people can really understand it. Most people seem to think we're just hanging around at home with nothing to do. But you and I know it's a full time job. Actually it's 2 full time jobs isn't it?

I decided today that only a couple truly academic things can happen each day. Is that reasonable? Maybe that's why it feels like all we do is math and science. Today, we mostly read The Sherwood Ring. The chapters are excessively long in that book, but we don't want to stop in the middle of one. Each one is a complete story on its own. Who can stand to let a story go unfinished?

I really need to get my ideas together on the book report assignments. I'm going to make them interesting. No summaries. They're going to do things like interview the main character, or write a letter from one character to another or make up a story line that might be going on in the background of the plot. I guess that's called a sub-plot. Should be fun.

Rachel watched 2 or 3 MathUSee lessons today. I ordered her the Geometry because she hasn't done that yet. It's on its way, but in the meantime she's watching the digital lessons. Sam and Sarah worked on a math sheet where procedures and rules were involved. I'm going to have to back up and get logical with Sam. The rules just drive him crazy. They make him forget what he already knows how to do logically. Sarah just blasted through it loving the security of knowing the rules. It honestly amazes me how different they can be. Lots of different personalities here!

See you tomorrow!

Day 46--Moms support group

I had so much fun with the other homeschool moms talking about things that no one else has ever understood! It's after midnight, so I'm going to have to write all about it tomorrow. But I think I'm going to love this. We decided to go on field trips together about once a month too. So excited!

We got an offer on our empty house today. It isn't as much money as we'd like, but we're going to take it anyway. And I don't think we'll have to put in carpet or resurface the floor after all. It will be such a relief to not have to maintain that house and yard any more.

We're liking The Sherwood Ring still, and we've been listening to 101 Dalmations as a dramatized audio book this week too. That's pretty fun. We've never done audio books, but it could be something we do a bit more of. I just have a hard time listening to a book and getting the story. I'd rather read it myself.

That's it for tonight. More about the moms' group tomorrow.

See you then!